Efforts to lessen pressures on Europe's environment are making uneven progress while pressure is continuing to grow on some natural resources, especially fish stocks and land, the European Environment Agency's latest annual assessment shows

Efforts to lessen pressures on Europe's environment are making
uneven progress while pressure is continuing to grow on some natural
resources, especially fish stocks and land, the European Environment
Agency's latest annual assessment shows.

Environmental signals 2002, launched today at a series of events in
Brussels, points to positive overall trends across the European Union
in emissions of climate-changing greenhouse gases and generation of
waste, as well as to confirmed reductions in water and air
pollution.

Greenhouse gas emissions are 3.5% lower than in 1990, even if they
showed a slight rise in the year 2000; emissions of several air
pollutants have been substantially reduced; the total amount of waste,
though still increasing, appears to be growing more slowly than the
economy; and the introduction of many new sewage treatment plants is
cutting polluting discharges to rivers and other water bodies.

However, these overall reductions are in many cases due to large
cuts in only a few countries or economic sectors, the report cautions.
Many countries and some sectors have not contributed to the positive
trends, making progress patchy.

And time-lags before these falls translate into improvements in the
quality of the environment, combined with high background
concentrations of pollutants from past emissions and sources elsewhere,
mean that the impact of these pressures remains a concern.

Consequently, large areas of natural habitats and agricultural land
are still exposed to acidificaton. There is little sign that
eutrophication is becoming less of a problem in coastal waters. And a
substantial proportion of Europe's urban population remains exposed to
high concentrations of harmful ground-level ozone and fine
particles.

Pressure on some natural resources is continuing to increase. This
is particularly the case for fisheries. Despite an overall decline in
fleet capacity, continued over-fishing is putting many of the
commercially important European fish stocks at high risk of
collapse.

Land resources also remain subject to significant pressures, such as
urban sprawl and the expansion of transport infrastructure.

Over the last 20 years the built-up area in major western and
eastern European countries has increased by some 20%, much faster than
EU population growth (6%). This has caused loss or disturbance of
natural areas and significant fragmentation of animal and plant
habitats in most of Europe.

Domingo Jiménez-Beltrán, EEA Executive Director, said:

"There is still a long way to go to ensure environmental issues are
accorded due weight in the decision-making process alongside economic
and social considerations.

"Providing environmental information such as this annual review of
the state of the environment is therefore essential if policies and
other initiatives are to be reviewed, reorientated and improved to
ensure they contribute to the ultimate goal of a more sustainable
Europe.”

He continued:

"Annual environmental reviews do not generally reveal dramatic
changes in the state of the environment: their value lies in the
identification of underlying trends and expectations of change, and the
provision of early warnings of potential concerns.

"This year's report shows a mixed picture for the issues covered,
without major changes in the state of the environment since the first
Environmental signals report was published two years ago.

"However, to a certain extent the conditions for future change are
emerging at the political level in the EU. This is thanks to the
adoption of the EU Sustainable Development Strategy, finalisation of
the Sixth Environment Action Programme and the continuing drive to
integrate environmental concerns into sectoral policies, even if
results have sometimes been disappointing.”

Mr Jiménez-Beltrán drew three main conclusions from Environmental
signals 2002:

The process of "dematerialisation” -- improving quality of life
while reducing consumption of energy and materials -- which was
anticipated with the transition to a more service-oriented economy has
not yet been fully exploited.

Some environmental pressures continue to be closely tied to
economic development. Examples are greenhouse gas emissions from
transport and tourism; land and soil degradation; energy and resource
consumption by households; and reduction of stocks by fishing. Other
pressures, such as mining and industrial waste, are growing more slowly
than the economy but still increasing in absolute terms.

On average the EU is using energy more efficiently, but it is still
not reducing energy consumption in absolute terms. Also, while some
countries have shown that targets, such as increasing the share of
renewable energy in their energy mix, can be met, others have seen
their energy efficiency deteriorate. The successful expansion of
renewable energy is being undermined by an overall increase in the
consumption of energy, especially electricity.

Households' contribution to environmental pressures is often
overlooked. As consumption levels continue to rise in parallel with
disposable income, the need to help consumers make informed choices is
becoming increasingly important. Eco-labelling and information
dissemination, such as campaigns to encourage energy savings, are
growing but their use remains marginal.

Acidification is the deposition of acidifying substances that can
damage environmental media such as freshwater systems, forests, soil
and natural ecosystems. The acidifying substances originate largely
from man-made emissions of three gaseous pollutants: sulphur dioxide,
nitrogen oxides and ammonia.

Eutrophication is the excessive enrichment of waters with
nutrients, causing adverse biological effects which lead to depletion
of the waters' oxygen content, consequently inhibiting their ability to
support animal and plant life.

The EU has set indicative goals of increasing renewable energy
sources' share of total energy consumption to 12% and their share of
electricity consumption to 22.1%, both by 2010.

About the EEA

The European Environment Agency is the main source of information
used by the European Union and its Member States in developing
environment policies. The Agency aims to support sustainable
development and to help achieve significant and measurable improvement
in Europe's environment through the provision of timely, targeted,
relevant and reliable information to policy-making agents and the
public. Established by the EU in 1990 and operational in Copenhagen
since 1994, the EEA is the hub of the European environment information
and observation network (EIONET), a network of some 600 bodies across
Europe through which it both collects and disseminates
environment-related data and information.

The Agency, which is open to all nations that share its objectives,
currently has 29 member countries. These are the 15 EU Member States;
Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein, which are members of the European
Economic Area; and 11 of the 13 countries in central and eastern Europe
and the Mediterranean area that are seeking accession to the EU --
Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia,
Lithuania, Malta, Romania, Slovenia and the Slovak Republic. Their
membership makes the EEA the first EU body to take in the candidate
countries. It is anticipated that the two remaining candidate
countries, Poland and Turkey, will ratify their membership agreements
within the next few months. This will take the Agency's membership to
31 countries. Negotiations with Switzerland on membership are also
under way.